Deadline (23 page)

              
Some of us saw Bertin pulled from the water by rescue crews. Some of us may still grieve over the death of someone who was such a familiar face at ball games and Grange meetings and school plays, someone who was such a part of the fabric of life in Androscoggin.

              
And many still may wonder what happened.

              
This was not a typical drowning, if there is such a thing. Arthur Bertin did not go for a moonlight swim. He did not capsize a canoe in cold waters on a spring fishing trip. Arthur Bertin died in the murky water of a walled canal in a remote and deserted industrial area. The circumstances of his death would lead any sensible person to ask questions. Apparently, the local and state authorities charged with investigating incidents of this type are not sensible people.

              
What other explanation could there be?

              
After examining the body, Chief Medical Examiner Dr. Richard Ritano ruled that Bertin's death was an accidental drowning. When pressed by the
Review
, Ritano himself said there were no discernible signs of foul play. He also said the fact that no one knows why Bertin was in the area isn't enough to rule the death suspicious.

              
But if these circumstances are not enough to raise the question of foul play, what does it take?

              
Facts to consider:

              
As of this writing, the Androscoggin Police Department has not interviewed any of Bertin's acquaintances to determine if the victim was despondent or suffering from any other mental condition that might be relevant to his death.

              
Police did not search the canal or surrounding area to see if any clues to the death could be found.

              
The autopsy showed the secondary cause of death was hypothermia, indicating Bertin was in the water for some time before he died.

          
State and local police are responsible for two things in the event of a violent crime: One, they must uphold the rights of the victim by bringing the perpetrator of the deed to justice. Two, they must protect the public by keeping the criminal from repeating his crime.

              
In this case, local and state authorities have done neither. They have not upheld Bertin's rights. Nor are they protecting the rest of us. A full investigation should begin immediately. The community deserves more from its police and prosecutors than just a rubber stamp.

It was long, but they'd read it.

I pored over it for a few minutes before closing the screen. As I pushed the chair back from the desk, I hoped I was doing the right thing. New York agitator, Vern had said. Maybe I was. And what about New York? If they had pulled Arthur out of the East River,
would the investigation have been any more thorough? Would there have been any investigation at all? Would I have cared?

Maybe not, but Androscoggin was different. The numbness that comes from anonymity had not found its way here. People lived in a town like this because they expected to matter to many people. They gave to the community and the community gave back. That was the deal. And in this case the deal had been broken. Arthur had given to the town and the town was not giving back. It was a double cross—welshing on a debt. It wasn't right, and the newspaper was the only institution in this town that would do anything about it. And the newspaper was me.

I opened the screen, read the top few lines, skipped down to the conclusion, and closed the file. And when I did, when the screen went blank, I felt something else.

Fear.

I was crawling out on a limb on this one, way out, farther out than I'd ever gone at the
Times
or the
Courant
or the
Journal
. I was the paper. I was the whole thing. The entire paper was my opinion column, and this opinion was not going to be well received. The day it came out, I would walk down the street. I would walk into the Pine Tree and sit at the counter. I would sit at my desk and answer the telephone. I would sit at home with my name in the phone book. And things had been nuts already. What would the next Pauline Wiggins do? Who would I find in my living room next week?

In New York, the security guards would catch the crazies in the lobby. I was anonymous, a face in a room that couldn't be reached, a gun in a building where nobody knew anybody else.

This was not like that.

I couldn't avoid it forever, and Monday morning, I got it full force.

When I walked in the door, Cindy, Marion, Paul, and even a woman I didn't know, hopefully a paid-up subscriber, crowded around me. Vern watched from his desk, a phone stuck in his ear, the model of discretion.

They wanted details. How many shots were fired? How close did I come to getting hit? Did I have to wrestle with her to get the gun away? Did I break her arm?

I looked at them, at the woman I didn't know, and held my arms out straight.

“It wasn't like that,” I said. “She's got some problems, that's all. That's all there is to it. Really. She got upset and it happened and it's too bad. For everybody. But it worked out the best it could, and that's all I can really tell you. You understand, I'm sure.”

We understand one thing, their faces said. It was the most excitement around the
Review
in years, and I was ruining it.

“Well, God, Jack,” Cindy said, speaking for the group. “You could have been killed. It's not like this happens every day. You make it sound like, ‘Oh, yeah, somebody came over and tried to shoot me. La dee dah dee dum. Pass the potatoes.' I mean, you could've been killed, you know? I mean, it's Pauline. It's not like it's some criminal. So why did she do it? I mean, go over and try to blow you away. It's unreal; I mean, it's just unbelievable.”

And wonderful.

Cindy's eyes were glittering. She was energized, as alive as I'd ever seen her. A monotonous life transformed instantly by proximity to near tragedy. Something extraordinary could have happened. It could have happened to this guy she knew. Oh, yeah. She saw him every day. And then bang. Shot dead by somebody else she knew. If this was possible,
anything could happen. Cindy could meet some really rich and cute guy and he would think she was great and they would get married with this really ritzy ceremony and move to California or Florida, where the whole town didn't stink like something had spilled in the oven and it was burning. Marion could win the lottery and buy her kids new mobile homes and put in a pool, an in-the-ground pool, none of this above-the-ground junk, and they would get a camper or even a motor home and drive to Alaska. Paul could get into this business where you never have to do anything, once it gets off the ground, but you rake in the dough and you buy a new 'Vette and you never have to kiss ass in this town again. And Vern … I didn't know about Vern.

“Maybe we ought to give Jack a break,” he said. “You know, ‘Stand back, give him some air.' Think so, Cindy? Get the dirt later. Let the guy at least take his coat off.”

“God, Vern, I was just worried about him,” Cindy shot back. “Something wrong with wanting to know what happened? This is a newspaper, you know.”

“That's the rumor,” Vern said, leaning against the counter, a toothpick in the corner of his mouth.

“Well, I don't care,” Cindy said. “Do what you want. I've got work to do.”

Then, as she turned and walked back behind the counter, she said, “I don't know where the hell you get off.”

I stood there in the middle of the entryway for a second, then sighed and went to my desk. The phone rang. A college kid named Dirk or Bert or something wanted to spend the month of January working with us as part of a journalism course at the University of Maine at Orono.

Do us both a favor and stay home, I thought.

“Call me in a week,” I said.

A middle-aged woman came in to put in a classified, apartment for rent. Something about her daughter and her boyfriend. Paul was on the phone, taking some heat about an ad. Vern drifted over.

“How you doing?” he said quietly, sliding his sandbag body onto the edge of my desk.

“Could be better. Could be worse.”

“I guess. Missed you, huh?”

“You did?”

“Pauline did,” Vern said.

“Had me all choked up there for a minute.”

“Sentimental fool,” Vern said, and he smiled.

He had his coffee cup resting on his lap. When he lifted it up, it left a dark damp ring on his pants.

“It boggles the mind,” he said. “This old lady. She probably never shot a gun. Never did anything violent at all. In her whole life. Then she goes berserk. Nutzo. You know what it shows?”

“What?”

“That people have sides to them that nobody sees. Nobody. I've always said that. You only see what shows on the outside. The tip of the iceberg.”

Vern held his forefinger and thumb an inch apart. “The tip,” he said. “What pissed her off?”

I hesitated.

“I'll … I'll tell you later. No, I can tell you.”

I lowered my voice.

“You know the picture of Martin? Well, I guess he just went to her and told her all about it. A clean breast of things and all that. I guess she decided it was gonna ruin the guy or something.”

“Stuck by her man, huh?”

“And then some. It was kind of noble, really. And sad. Jeez, I still can't believe it happened. Think it'll be in the
Sun?
God almighty. That's all I need. God, talk about ruining a guy.”

“Hey, it's what we do best,” Vern said. “But the Sunday people, not from around here, might not have even heard about it.”

“About time I got lucky. Hey, you got a second? I'd like you to give something a read for me.”

Standing at my desk while I flipped most of the mail in the trash, Vern read the editorial twice.

“Two things,” he said.

He flipped the toothpick from the left side of his mouth to the right.

“I'm glad it's you and not me. And I think you're right. No, I really do. He wasn't canoeing down there.”

“Nope.”

“He had bad circulation. He'd turn blue in a cool breeze. Remember how I tried to get him to do those ice-fishing pics last spring? First time Arthur, meek, mild-mannered Arthur, told me to take a hike.”

“Yeah, I remember that. He said he wasn't going to get frostbite for pictures of dead fish.”

I smiled.

“Son of a bitch,” Vern said. “Should have fired his ass.”

“Always the hard guy,” I said.

The phone rang. And then it rang again. And again after that.

A request for a picture of a ninetieth birthday party. Kids from the school, fourth graders, had written letters to pen pals in Kiev, Russia. The teacher, a woman who sounded young and nice, suggested
a picture of the kids in front of a mailbox, mailing the letters. If she could take the picture herself, she was hired.

Some guy from the mill, a worker who wouldn't give his name, bent my ear for fifteen minutes about how the town needed St. Amand Paper, and if we didn't accommodate them, somebody else would. And then where would my paper be? And then where would the town be? There would be no town, and this country would be owned by the Japanese, and they wouldn't have to bomb Pearl Harbor because they'd own it.

International Day at the
Androscoggin Review
.

I told him all the facts should be brought out, then the town could decide whatever the hell they wanted to decide. He went back to the beginning, but I lied and said I had another call and he hung up, just in time for Cindy to hand me another stack of mail, spilling half of it on the floor.

She bent and picked up the envelopes, while I threw the bigger stuff in the wastebasket. The recognizable stuff I separated into piles for Rewrite or Sports or Letters. Still kneeling, Cindy handed me a large brown envelope addressed to
JACK MCMORROW
, personal. I sniffed it and couldn't smell perfume, but I opened it anyway and then shook it. A note came out and landed on the floor, and there was a photograph left inside, which I started to take out.

From the floor, Cindy gasped.

“Oh my God,” she said, straightening.

She was looking at the picture in my hand. I turned it over to see.

Roxanne.

17

S
he was naked. The word
WHORE
was written across her belly. I couldn't get a breath. I couldn't swallow.

Cindy handed me the note.

It was the same printing that was on the photo.

          
Your trash. The girl is a whore. You leave now or she's a dead whore. You're trouble for this town. You've got bigger problems, Mr. Newspaperman. Like dead whores at 192 Brackett St. Portland. Go back to New Jersey, or you will be dead too.